AS a star on Corrie, Natalie Gumede took the early starts and long days on set in her stride.

Strictly should have been a dance in the park compared with her time on the cobbles but, just 11 weeks into the competition, she admits to being so exhausted that she feels like she has aged two years.

“I’ve toned up but I do feel I’ve aged. I feel like I’ve lived two years on Strictly. It is definitely the hardest thing I’ve ever done,” said the 29-year-old.

“September seems like a lifetime ago, I cant believe we are only on week 11.”

Clearly a perfectionist, Natalie has a punishing rehearsal schedule – a minimum of seven hours each day to get her dances right for the weekend.

It’s no wonder she fainted last month and needed to be rushed to hospital just hours before the show.

Since then, though, she’s at least started to give herself Sundays off to relax.

Natalie and dance partner Artem (Image: Daily Mirror)

“I feel very, very vulnerable. Even after 30 or 40 hours of training, we are not at the stage where we will be consistently good. Things can still go wrong,” she said.

Her partner Artem Chigvintsev seems to be a fairly strict teacher in the session I watch but Natalie also never stops pushing herself to get things right.

She said: “This morning we went over and over a step and I was not getting it right and I cried. I was just so frustrated and I couldn’t express why.

“You learn you just have to have a bit of humility and let it all go.”

In previous years, Natalie would have been odds-on favourite to be the celeb lifting the Strictly Glitterball at the end of December.

She started brilliantly and has consistently had high scores from the judges. But many viewers have still failed to warm to her.

The fact she has some dance training from her youth has angered some of the audience.

Others don’t think she comes across as a friendly face on the show, even unfairly criticising her as “fake” when she collapsed and fainted on set, causing her to miss a week of Strictly.

Perhaps, though, some still see her as her Corrie character – nasty husband-beating Kirsty Soames who she played for 18 months until April.

Before she began about the criticism she’s faced, Natalie’s loud cackling laugh was filling the cafe near where she rehearses with Artem in north London.

But the Twitter and Facebook comments have clearly affected her.

“It has saddened me a bit because you are only human but we try to focus on the support rather than the negativity,” she said.

“I am trying to be myself and give the most I can. If that doesn’t come across, then I have to accept that.”

Referring to her body language on the show, Natalie looks a little teary and adds: “I hope I am somebody that is warm but at times I have been supremely nervous before I have been able to relax into it.

“So perhaps I haven’t come across as warm because when you’re on the show, you’re trying to control yourself and hold it together.”

Despite that, Natalie is determined to relax and enjoy the rest of her Strictly experience.

“I want to use these last few weeks to get out there and love it,” she said.

“I didn’t join the show with any agenda for my career or to win. I came on because I love to dance and I never had an opportunity to learn this kind of stuff before.”

Taking part in the show has been a long-held dream. She said: “I’ve been a fan of the show since forever, series one, and what I have always enjoyed is how people apply themselves and how they enjoy it.

“I never, ever take that for granted or let if affect me because I could see that, yes, I started off with a higher skill set than the others but people have more than caught me up and overtaken me.”

Backstage, Natalie has built up a close friendship with fellow contestant Susanna Reid, who she “clings to in this ride” and says can be described as her “source of perspective and stability” but also with the ability to be “wild”.

Natalie also enjoys the company of Abbey Clancy – “A girl next door who doesn’t realise the talent she has” – and Sophie Ellis-Bextor, “the coolest girl in school,” who sounds like the calmest contestant left in the competition.

Looking back at the last three months, Natalie also admits that the show has taught her some life lessons.

She said: “I have learned more humility, more patience and how far to push myself. The fainting was an inevitability and gave me perspective.

“I have learned to let go a little bit – I am a bit of a control freak. Now I know I can’t be in control of everything.”

And it certainly seems that while she does take the dancing seriously, Natalie is bubbly and a good laugh when not on the dance floor.

Unlike some of the other stars, getting up close and personal with male dancers and backstage dressers has not been a problem, which is a good job as she had a baptism of fire.

“On the first day I was trying on all the costumes,” she recalled.

“I was half-naked and Vicki, who makes the costumes, grabbed my boobs and hoiked them into the leotard. It wasn’t weird. She was just helping me get into the costume and we laughed about it.”

While Natalie isn’t keen to talk about her private life, there isn’t really much to discuss right now with her Strictly schedule.

She is living in London as she has done for 12 years and there is no serious man on the scene.

The one thing she does want is a holiday and she hopes to head off at Christmas to somewhere warm before returning to start rehearsals for the Strictly UK tour.

Right now, she and Artem are focusing on their next dance.

“We are doing the paso doble. Each week, the dances are getting harder and Artem makes the dances more difficult but there is also the emotional aspect.

“We are all at a stage now where we are physically tired and so we are affected so much more by music.

“But I am so happy on the show and I have gained so much more than I expected to.”

Strictly continues on BBC1 tonight and tomorrow night. The show’s 2014 UK tour starts on January 17 with the Glasgow dates on February 1 and 2. For info visit strictlycomedancinglive.com